


run

by mcmeekin



Category: Power Rangers, Power Rangers Jungle Fury, Power Rangers Lightspeed Rescue, Power Rangers Mystic Force, Power Rangers Ninja Storm, Power Rangers Samurai, Power Rangers Wild Force, Power Rangers in Space
Genre: Gen, basically dealing with aftermath??? good that's a tag, team fic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-12-22
Updated: 2014-12-22
Packaged: 2018-03-02 19:24:45
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,862
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2823311
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mcmeekin/pseuds/mcmeekin
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>You can’t go on a journey of self-discovery without a badass motorcycle.</p>
            </blockquote>





	run

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Hagar](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Hagar/gifts).



> Okay confession time: I tried to write for literally every other prompt before giving in to my secret love of dealing with the fallout of being a ranger and writing for this one. So hopefully you love that as much as I do? I took the prompt from the perspective of the traveler instead of the left-behind which I hope is okay? Fingers crossed, here goes nothing! Hope you like it!  
> Also I’m sorry that this is literally the longest thing that’s ever existed; I went the crossover route, and it got so out of hand.

_You can leave this house, leave this town_

_Leave it all to me or you'll never leave the ground_

_Look at that tiny screen's too small for you_

_I think you should learn to dream just like the dreamers do_

 

Nick never stays for long. Then again, he never leaves for long either.

 

It takes him three months to come back the first time, and he probably only does because he gets sick of his parents—both sets of them. It’s a month before he’s gone again, but he comes back within the week. It kicks off an almost-pattern: stay for a month, leave, stay, leave. His trips range anywhere from a day to two weeks to (occasionally) a couple of months, but he always comes back. Sometimes he even takes one of them. Vida goes with him to a concert. Xander tags along for some sort of sporting event. Nick and Daggeron go on a road trip with no destination in mind. Or, at least, not one they want to disclose. That happens more than it should with Nick.

Sometimes the destinations are highly specific and motivated: he wants to visit his parents, a relative, a friend, or attend an event, or drive three towns over and back because he can. Most times, though, he’s vague.

It’s not like Madison asks; he just always tells her something before he leaves. Sometimes he doesn’t even tell his parents, just her. He’ll drop it into conversation one night while they’re washing dishes or a morning when they’re restocking shelves. It’s always, “I’m thinking about leaving.” Rarely a destination, never a departure date. She’s learned to interpret it as, “I’ll be gone in the morning, and I have no idea where I’m going.” He’ll usually call or email or text or (if the trip’s extended) send a postcard along the way and tell her where he ends up when he gets there.

She doesn’t get it most of the time, why he keeps leaving. There’s never a dull moment in Briarwood anymore. One day in the Rockporium alone is enough entertainment to last her weeks. The people of the forest don’t always… _understand_ the music or technology of the residents of Briarwood, which is how she finds herself explaining the weirdest things to grown people day in and day out. Yesterday it was the concept of genres and the differences between them. Today it’s the proper treatment of CDs versus vinyl records.

And the _politics_. Madison suddenly finds herself the deciding opinion on debates ( _Should there be a magic ban after dark in the city to avoid accidents? Can you even curfew magic?_ ), one of the go-to people for advice about new legislation ( _Is placing a tax on items created with magic a viable way to satisfy suppliers who are complaining that magic produced items can sell for less since they’re created more quickly?_ ), and some sort of pseudo-judge/police officer ( _Yes, but Mystic Blue, I swear it was him who put the potion in my drink; look, if you’ll just trace the magic, you’ll see!_ or _Mystic Blue, you can’t just let magic creatures go to regular jail—they can escape! You’ve got to come up with a better punishment for them than that._ )

No, there is never a dull moment in Briarwood, and she doesn’t get how Nick could ever become bored with it.

Then again, there are days when staying in Briarwood becomes nearly unbearable.

Because they call her Mystic Blue. People who have known her since she was in diapers call her ‘Mystic Blue’. Or ‘Blue Ranger’ or ‘Miss’ or any other slew of names that hold way too much respect for her to be entirely comfortable with. She gets it when it’s creatures from the magic realm but her neighbors? Toby and Leelee are the only ones who act normal around her anymore.

The other rangers are next to no help. Vida would rather hang out and DJ than attend city council meetings. Chip has knight training. Xander’s more motivated than the other two, but he’s usually less than helpful in resolving things, not to mention easily distracted. She does appreciate the effort though. Nick tries, but the people of the city are less trustful of him and the people of the forest are too trustful of him for him to really get anything done. So it’s up to her. And she feels so overwhelmed all the time. She just wants to be able to walk down the street without having to break up a fight or get approached about a problem.

Nick takes Vida to New York to go clubbing. When she comes back, she doesn’t stop talking about it for a week. But all Madison hears are the parts where Vida describes how big it is, how you can get lost in the people so easily, how it’s nothing like Briarwood. Briarwood starts feeling…small. Cramped. Suffocating. Her teammates start to annoy her; their excuses for not helping her start to feel weak.

That’s when the idea comes to her.

She puts it on a sticky note (“I’m leaving, and I have no idea where I’m going”) and steals Nick’s bike. She doesn’t know why, just that this trip can’t happen without it. She drives blindly, not even realizing where she’s taking herself until she’s halfway there.

She’s met the Ninja Storm team before, several times in fact. She and Tori exchange emails and calls all the time. So she’s not sure why she shows up at Cam’s apartment instead of Tori’s.

She makes weak excuses about passing through and wanting to check in with him and the team. He doesn’t buy it, she can tell, but he invites her in. He doesn’t ask her where she’s going or how long she’ll be staying, and then she realizes why she came to Cam and not Tori.

Her offers her food and coffee, and they stay up late catching up on unimportant things.

“Crash on my couch tonight,” he offers when she points out that it’s late, and she should probably be going. “Tori’ll kill me if I let you leave this late and without even telling her you’re in town.” She only protests a little before accepting. Besides, she wants to see everyone.

In the morning, Cam takes her with him to the academy. He must have called the night before because Dustin, Shane, and Tori are all waiting at the entrance for her.

Tori sweeps her up in a hug as soon as Madison climbs off the bike. She grins and hugs her friend back.

“It’s so good to see you!” Tori exclaims as she steps back. “And with a bike? Careful, Dustin’s been gunning for one of those for a couple years now.”

Sure enough, Dustin’s already eyeing it critically. “Isn’t this Nick’s?”

“Maybe?” she says a little guiltily.

“I was wondering where you got that,” Cam mutters.

“Speaking of Nick, next time you see him, tell him he owes Hunter and me a rematch. He’ll know what for,” Shane says with a grin, extending his hand to greet her. She grins back and shakes it.

“You know, you couldn’t have picked a better day for a surprise visit because I’m teaching my advanced water elementals class today,” Tori says, linking arms with Madison as they walk up to the academy. “You can help me explain the art of water-walking.”

She had forgotten how easy it is to be around the ninjas, how happy they are all the time. She floats around their classes all day and all of them introduce her to their students like she’s a prized teacher and the students are blessed to be in her presence. Which is actually the way Dustin phrases it, making her laugh.

She finds Dustin again, near the end of the day, sitting by the waterfall as the sun goes down. It looks almost poetic, almost relaxing.

“Can I sit?” she asks.

He looks up at her and smiles. “Of course.”

She does, and they sit in silence for a while. She watches the sun’s dying rays flick across the water.

“So, how was your day as a Wind Ninja teacher?” he asks, bumping shoulders with her.

She smiles slightly. “I kept thinking about Daggeron, how he’d probably have a heart attack if he saw the way you trained these kids.”

Dustin smiles down at the water. “Is he very…structured?”

“Structured. That’s a good way to put it,” she agrees.

Dustin shrugs. “Cam’s the same way.”

“Maybe it’s a sixth thing,” she suggests.

“Or maybe they’re just uptight,” Dustin counters, flashing a grin at her.

Madison shoves him good naturedly with her shoulder. “Cam’s not uptight.”

“And Daggeron is?”

“No,” she says defensively. “He’s just…a natural teacher. Who sometimes puts training over being a friend.”

Dustin’s quiet for a moment. “And you like him as a friend better.”

It’s not a question, so she doesn’t answer it. They fall into silence.

Eventually he asks offhandedly, “Do you think that if a person covered themselves in dirt I could control them?”

“What?” she asks, thrown by the abruptness of the question.

“I mean, just imagine Shane covered in dirt doing ballet,” he says, staring off into the distance pensively, and she cracks up. He flashes a huge grin at her, and she thinks about how she can’t remember the last time she laughed this much in one day.

It isn’t until she's leaving that she thinks that maybe that was the point. She’s saying her goodbyes, telling them she has to leave, when it’s Tori’s turn. She’s the last one, and she hugs her tightly before Madison climbs on the bike.

“So, where’re you headed?” Tori asks.

Madison shrugs. “Wherever.”

Tori grins. “You sound like Blake. He never seems to know where he's headed. Well, if you’re hungry, a couple towns over there is a _killer_ pizza joint. It’s owned by a former ranger. I’ll text you the address.”

Madison smiles as she pulls her helmet on. “Thanks Tori.”

Tori flashes a smile before asking hesitantly, “Are you happy, Madi?”

The question sort of throws her, but she thinks about it for a moment. “I was today.”

As Madison leaves, she stops at a gas station and buys a postcard. She addresses it to Nick and writes, “1) Do what you love with people you love,” on the back.

 

The pizza joint is dark when she drives up. She suspects it might be closed (which wouldn’t surprise her; it is early morning and still dark outside), but as she approaches the building, a light comes on inside and the door opens.

A man steps out and looks down the sidewalk at her. His face is half illuminated by the light from the restaurant. “Madison Rocca?” She nods, stuffing her hands in her jacket pockets awkwardly. His face splits into a grin. “Tori called, told us to expect you. Come on in; it’s cold out here.”

He steps back slightly to hold the door open for her. She only hesitates a moment before going inside. He closes the door behind them, and she notices that he doesn’t flip the sign to indicate that the store is open.

“Take your jacket off; make yourself comfortable,” he instructs her. “I’m Dominic, by the way. Jungle Fury Rhino Ranger.” He shakes her hand. “Call me Dom.”

“Madison, Mystic Force Blue,” she says before taking her jacket off and hanging it next to the door. “You the owner?”

Dom smiles and shakes his head. “That would be RJ. Hang on; I’ll get him. Breakfast’ll be out in a sec,” he says as he walks toward the kitchen door.

“No, no,” she protests. “I don’t want to be any trouble.”

He laughs, turning back to face her. “This is a pizza place; food is sort of our thing.” He pushes open the kitchen door and begins talking to someone inside as he enters.

She looks around the restaurant curiously. Jungle themed and cozy, she wonders how a power ranger team operated out of this place. She takes a seat at one of the tables and peruses the menu idly. Some of the options make her smile with their names and wonder at their ingredients.

A man pokes his head out the kitchen door. “Madison, right?” She nods, putting the menu down and smiling at him. “RJ,” he says, indicating himself. “Store owner and Jungle Fury Wolf Ranger. Hang on; food’s coming.”

She smiles a little and shakes her head. They’re so casual, so reflexively hospitable that she wonders if they even considered turning her away to a hotel until they actually opened. Wonders if it crossed their minds that they didn’t have any real reason that they had to be nice to her.

The kitchen door opens again, and four people come out carrying trays laden with food.  
“Madison!” RJ exclaims like he’s surprised to see her despite having seen her a few moments before. “Meet Fran and Flit, my two favorite employees.”

“I take offense to that,” Dom says as he lays a tray of food down on her table.

“Oh, hush,” the waitress, Fran, scolds him, putting her tray down on the table next to Madison’s and pushing it together with hers. “It’s lovely to meet you, Madison,” she says with a smile.

“Yes, yes lovely to meet you,” the other waiter, Flit, agrees.

“You do realize this is way too much food, right?” Madison says incredulously, looking around at the four tables that have been pushed together to accommodate all of it.

“Ah, but you will not have to eat it all by yourself.” RJ is pulling up chairs around the newly-formed mega table.

Madison opens her mouth to ask what he means but is prevented from doing so by the door opening. A man shuffles in, already shedding his jacket and asking, “Why is it always inhumanly warm in here while it’s inhumanly cold outside?”

“Casey!” Fran exclaims, racing to hug the man. The door opens again, and four other people file in, all of them talking over one another. Jackets are taken off, hugs are exchanged, and Madison feels a little lost and overwhelmed.

She doesn’t realize she’s standing until RJ says loudly, “I think introductions are in order,” and all attention snaps to her.

“Madison Rocca, right?” one of the girls says. “Mystic Force Blue Ranger?”

“That’d be me,” Madison replies with a small smile.

A grin breaks onto the girl’s face. “Tori called, said you were on your way.” She extends her hand. “Lily Chilman, Jungle Fury Yellow Ranger.” Madison shakes the hand offered hesitantly. Lily doesn’t seem to notice her wariness. “This is Casey Rhodes, our Red,” Lily says, gesturing to the first man through the door. He smiles and waves. She returns the smile. “This is Theo Martin, Blue.” The man on the right side of Lily nods. “And this is Jarrod and Camille!”

Jarrod extends his hand. “Pleasure to meet you.” Madison smiles as she shakes his hand. Camille offers her a tight-lipped smile.

“Well! Now that we all know each other, can we please eat? I’m starved!” Lily says, immediately moving to sit down.

“Always in a rush,” RJ teases lightly before turning to Madison. “Please, sit, eat. Or they’ll eat it all.” He glares slightly at the group who has taken their seats, including Fran, Dom, and Flit. Madison takes the seat she was in before as RJ sits at the opposite end of the table.

“You’re from Briarwood, right?” Casey asks before taking a bite.

Madison nods, contemplating which food item to try first. “All my life. This is really the first time I’ve left for longer than a day. Are you all from here?”

Casey smiles like she’s said something funny. “No, but we all live here. We teach at an academy up the road.”

“That explains the uniforms,” she says almost without thinking.

RJ chuckles. “They never were the most flattering.”

“Is the academy how the ninjas know you?” she asks, taking a bite of something on her plate and deciding it’s worth eating.

“We occasionally share teaching tips,” Theo says.

“And once we had a joint class,” Lily offers excitedly. “It was so fun; you guys remember?” There’re nods and fond smiles from around the table.

“Don’t you guys have classes to teach today?” Madison asks.

“Well, we should, but we gave everyone the day off,” Casey says offhandedly.

She looks up, surprised. “You just…took the day off.” Nods from everyone. “Why?”

Fran answers her. “Oh, they just do it every so often,” she says, gesturing the three rangers that had come in later. “They come help run the shop; it’s just like old times. Do you work somewhere Madison?”

She nods slowly. “A music shop. All the original rangers on my team used to work there together.”

“Used to?” Camille asks neutrally. It’s the first thing she’s said since she came in.

“Yeah, well, I guess we’re all still technically employed, but our Yellow doesn’t come around much anymore. He’s busy with some special training.” She realizes that “training to be a knight” probably isn’t normal outside of Briarwood.

“Aw, that’s a shame,” Lily says. “Working with your teammates is so fun.”

“That’s why days off are important!” Flit exclaims, and everybody laughs.

She thinks about that the whole time she’s with them.

She stays longer than she really should without even noticing. They teach her how to run the place when opening time rolls around. Dom gives her an apron and a hat and jokes that she’s an honorary waitress. She learns that running a pizza shop involves more impromptu flour fights than she expected. RJ offers her a place to sleep in the loft, and she ends up staying for over a week. Some days she helps out in the shop, some days she heads up to the academy to observe (and teach, when the rangers realize she’s there), and some days they take her sight-seeing. Different team members will do it on different days. They’ll show her all the places they defeated monsters or take her to attractions all over the city. Theo does it on her last day in the city.

When she mentions her plans to leave, he says, “Ah. Well then, it’s time you saw the best thing about our city.”

He takes her up the tallest skyscraper, which has an observation deck instead of a roof. The sunset, he tells her, can only properly be watched from up here.

He’s right, she decides, leaning against the railing as the sun goes down. The sunset might just be the best part of the city.

“So, Madison,” Theo says, coming up next to her. “You happy?”

She smiles because it’s the same question Tori asked her before Madison left. “This sunset is gorgeous,” she answers, avoiding the larger question.

On the way back to Jungle Karma, he says, “So, you know the ninjas, you’ve met the Pai Zhua…What’s next?”

She shrugs. “Got any more secret academies to recommend me?”

He laughs. “How about a secret order? You should check the samurais out. I’ll give you the address.”

On the way out of town, she stops to buy a postcard. She addresses it to Nick and writes on the back, “2) Take days off.”

 

When she rolls up to the address, she notices that the gate is open. Taking it as an invitation, she parks the bike inside next to _another_ bike.

“That’s Ji’s,” a voice says. She turns to see a blond girl standing in the doorway to the house.

“Ji’s…” Madison repeats slowly, putting her helmet down on the bike.

“Our mentor,” the girl says. “I’m Lauren. Red Samurai Ranger part two. Come inside; meet part one.”

During her visit, she stays in Shiba House with Lauren, her brother Jayden, and Mentor Ji, but each day Jayden and Lauren take her to visit another member of the team. They attend one of Kevin’s swimming practices and catch dinner with him afterward. They visit Mia’s apartment and get free cake samples from Mia’s homework. They get lunch with Antonio who comes with them to visit Emily and Mike up at the farm. After that, the whole team comes together to take her to amusement parks and movies and monuments and fishing (which Antonio declares her a “natural” at, prompting Mike to start exclusively calling her increasingly ridiculous water or blue-based nicknames) and skateboarding and all sorts of things.

It’s the second Friday of her stay when Mike and Emily show up at Shiba House at ten in the evening. She hears Mentor open the door and sigh. “Is it that time of month again?”

“Yep!” Mike says cheerfully.

Mentor sighs again. “Let me get my things.”

As Mentor goes back toward the bedrooms, Mike and Emily come in. “What’s going on?” Madison asks.

“Tradition,” Mike says with a wink.

“A tradition that I know nothing about and will never know anything about,” Mentor Ji says as he emerges with a suitcase. “In fact, the tradition doesn’t exist as far as I’m concerned, so I’m leaving for the weekend because I have important business to attend to, not because of said tradition.”

“You’re the best, Mentor!” Mike calls after him as he leaves just as Mia and Kevin arrive with Antonio on their heels.

Lauren and Jayden come around the corner. “No seriously, what’s going on?” Madison asks.

“I gotta hand it to you Gill Girl; you accidentally picked the best week to invade,” Mike says, clapping her on the shoulder.

“ _Visit_ , Mike,” Emily chides. “She’s visiting, not invading.”

“My room, come on,” he instructs, ignoring Emily and starting toward the bedrooms.

Madison follows, bewildered, and watches as everyone sits down in various places around the room. Mike stars rummaging around under the bed.

Emily finally appears to take pity on her and starts explaining, “Back when we were rangers, Jayden had a hard time…relaxing. So we chose a week out of each month to force him to have all the kinds of fun he would never have on his own.”

“Like skateboarding and amusement parks and movies,” Madison says, beginning to follow.

Emily smiles brightly. “You’ve got the idea. And at the end of the week, we’d come in here, play a game, and have a sleepover.”

“There’s no way Mentor let you guys just goof off for a week,” Madison says, shaking her head.

“We trained too,” Kevin says defensively.

“And they claim the outings are ‘team bonding exercises,’” Jayden says with a smirk.

“They are!” Antonio protests.

“Anyway,” Emily says. “After we defeated Xandred, we sort of realized that Lauren could benefit from a week of fun, so the tradition stuck.”

“What kind of game are we going to play?” Madison asks.

“Got it!” Mike says, resurfacing with a triumphant look on his face. He holds a bottle of alcohol. “Whose turn is it to pick the game?”

“Oh. That kind of game."

Mike shrugs, not a bit apologetic. “Jayden needed it, trust me.”

“It’s my turn,” Kevin says from his position on the floor. “But I forfeit to the guest of honor.”

Mike looks at her expectantly. “Know any good drinking games?”

She shakes her head. “The only one I’ve got is Never Have I Ever.”

“Oo, good idea!” Mia says.

“You’re just saying that because you always win with your cooking school friends,” Lauren complains good-naturedly.

“Am not!” she protests. “I’m saying it because this is team bonding, and that’s an excellent get-to-know-you game.”

Lauren shoots a look to Madison, as if to include her in a joke. “Whatever, circle up.”

“Ma’am yes ma’am,” Mike mutters.

They manage to all fit on the floor comfortably in a tight circle with the bottle in the middle.

“New Blue goes first,” Mike says as they settle.

She hesitates. “Is saying ‘never have I ever been a Samurai Ranger’ cheating?”

“Nope!” Antonio says cheerfully, reaching for the bottle.

“You were going to say the same thing but with ‘hereditary’ in it, weren't you?” Emily accuses with a sigh, accepting the bottle from him.

“You can’t prove it,” he replies with a grin.

“Jayden’s turn,” Mike says, taking the bottle from Emily.

Jayden thinks about it while the bottle finishes making its way around. “Never have I ever had a fight with my parents,” he decides. "That I can remember,” he adds absently.

Kevin is the first to reach for the bottle. “Playing the dead parents card early, are we?”

Jayden shrugs. “It was gonna come up eventually. Figured I’d beat Lauren to it.” Lauren shoves him lightly with her shoulder.

After Kevin, the rest of the rangers (sans Lauren) drink. When Mike passes her the bottle, she puts it back in the middle. He shoots her a confused look so she shrugs. “Dad left before I was born. Mom died when I was seven. I lived with my aunt until Vida turned eighteen. So, no fights with my parents that I remember. Lauren’s next.”

Lauren seems a little taken back by her admission, but she brushes it off easily enough. “Um…never have I ever…” Her face suddenly lights up. “Never have I ever thought Mia’s cooking was bad.”

Mike snatches the bottle from its place in the middle. “I’ll drink proudly to that.”

Mia glares at him. “I still can’t believe you guys wouldn’t just tell me.”

As the bottle makes its rounds, Mike glances at her. “C’mon Kevin, give us a good one. Mystic Mermaid hasn’t had anything to drink yet.”

“That’s not even an insult; that’s just my titan name!” Madison protests with a laugh.

Mike rolls his eyes. “The more alcohol in my system, the worse my insults get. Go Kevin, go!”

Kevin sighs deeply. “Never have I ever played a musical instrument.”

Emily drinks first (“Flute,” she says to Madison), but Mia takes it next. She shrugs at the look Kevin gives her. “My voice is an instrument.”

“In that case, should I drink twice?” Antonio asks, reaching for the drink. “Guitar,” he says to Madison, almost as an afterthought.

She sighs and takes the bottle. “Piano. A little,” she says before taking a drink. The drink burns as it slides down her throat. She never had been much of a drinker.

Jayden drinks next. “A little guitar,” he tells her.

To her surprise, Lauren takes the bottle from Jayden. “Piano. A lot.” Madison grins at her.

"I thought all you did was train?" Mike asks.

"Piano was part of training," Lauren says. "At least, my mentor thought so. Mia's turn."

“Never have I ever…” Mia begins. She smiles suddenly. “Spent eight straight hours playing a video game.”

Mike points an accusing finger at her. “That is targeting.” He drinks anyway. He goes to put the bottle back in the middle, but Madison takes it from him before he has the chance.

“Portal 2. No shame,” she says as she tips it back. Mike laughs and offers her a fist bump, which she accepts.

“My turn!” Emily exclaims. “Never have I ever been turned into an inanimate object. And you have to say what you were when you drink,” she adds at the end.

Mike nearly cackles as Jayden groans and reaches for the bottle. “A garden gnome.”

“I was a fan,” Mia offers, grabbing the bottle from Jayden.

“Dead fish,” Antonio says with a small shudder. “And almost eaten!”

Kevin takes the bottle next and mumbles something into it. “What was that, Kevin?” Lauren teases. “Speak up.”

“I was a music box dancer,” he says more loudly, and everyone laughs.

Madison takes the bottle. “Got turned into a statue once. It sucked.”

She sees Jayden sort of wince in sympathy.

“Never have I ever…had unreasonable expectations placed on me by my family, my mentor, or otherwise,” Antonio says brightly.

“Oh, you’ve been saving that one, haven’t you?” Jayden mutters, reaching for the bottle.

“Wait, I object,” Lauren says. “Mentor asked you to program an unprogramable box, an unprogramable zord, plus expected you to fight after doing those things. I’d call that unreasonable expectations.”

Antonio shrugs. “They weren’t unreasonable because I was able to do them.”

“Jayden was able to act as decoy,” Lauren protests.

“Just drink the alcohol Lauren,” Antonio says with fake exasperation. She does, begrudgingly. So does everyone else in the circle, some more reluctantly than others. When Mike finishes, he shoots her a questioning look, offering the bottle to her. She takes the drink from him with a sigh and drinks more than strictly necessary. They all look at her expectantly.

“My mentor,” she says. “She expected a lot out of all of us, _expects_ a lot out of all of us, but… It feels like she expects more from me.”

They’re quiet for a minute before Emily asks softly, “What does she expect from you?”

Madison shrugs. “To be kind and understanding and calm and collected and controlled and mature and sensible all the time. To be quiet, to say the right things, to be the _adult_ of the group. Because I’m the sensible sister, that’s what I do. God forbid I ever get angry or lose control or do something impulsive.”

It’s Jayden who breaks the silence. “Something impulsive like…stealing a bike and running away?”

“You should try it sometime,” she replies with a half-smile, and Lauren laughs.

“Well,” Mike says, breaking the weird mood they had all settled into. “Since Mia threw me under the bus, I’m throwing her. Never have I ever been afraid of frogs.”

Madison reaches for the bottle first. “My sister traumatized me.” That gets a few laughs.

Mia drinks with a glare in Mike’s direction, and, to the apparent surprise of everyone, Lauren drinks too. “They creep me out,” she defends.

They play a few more rounds before Emily falls asleep, at which point they all head off to bed.

Madison packs up a few days after that. Kevin watches her from the doorway for longer than she would have let any of the others.

“I can feel you staring,” she says finally.

“You’re leaving.” It’s not a question.

She answers anyway, “I’m feeling restless again.”

“Where are you going to go?”

She shrugs. “Got any suggestions?”

“A few,” he says but doesn’t elaborate.

Eventually he comes and sits on her bed, watching her put her new mementos in her bag. “Madison,” he says when her back is turned, “are you happy?”

She stiffens. “Not happy enough to go home.” She turns and puts the last thing in her bag.

Kevin nods slightly, like he understands. “You should visit the Astro Rangers.” He stands up off the bed. “They know a thing or two about leaving home. Hang on a second; I’ll get you an address.” She stares at the doorway for a long time, wondering how all the ranger teams know each other. And why the Blues keep asking her the same questions.

Her third postcard reads, “3) Spend more time with your team. Blame it on team bonding exercises.”

 

“I gotta say, when the samurais said they were sending us a lost puppy, I didn’t expect a sorceress.”

The address Kevin had given her belongs to Cassie Chan of all people, and Madison knows that by the end of this visit she’s gonna have to get an autographed record or Toby’s gonna kill her.

Cassie had opened the door as soon as Madison had knocked and ushered her into the living room of her _mansion_ where TJ was already sitting and watching TV. It had been a matter of yelling up a few sets of stairs to get the rest of the team gathered. Cassie had explained that while it was technically her house, most of the team crashed there regularly.

“Because it’s harder for the press to access,” Ashley had explained.

Madison recognizes them all. Their original fame is from being rangers, but most of them went on to do other things, making them independently famous.

They’ve all been sitting around the living room talking for hours when Cassie makes the sorceress comment.

Madison grins. “We’re not sorcerers, me and my team. Our mentor and her apprentice are, but we’re just regular magic users.”

“There’s a difference?” Carlos asks.

“Of course there’s a difference,” Karone replies slapping Carlos’s arm lightly. She was apparently currently in the middle of one of her three month visits to Earth. “Anyone born into the right disposition can _use_ magic. It takes years and years of training to have the kind of mastery a sorcerer has. Honestly Carlos.” Madison grins at the teasing.

“Will you do a spell for us?” Ashley asks excitedly, ignoring Carlos who was trying to argue with Karone.

Madison smiles mischievously. “Only if one of the Kernovians will show me the telekinesis that the media can never quite prove they have.”

“Busted,” TJ mutters with a smile.

“Deal,” Zhane says, leaning forward, not the least perturbed.

Madison reaches into her pocket and retrieves her wand. After thinking a moment, she punches in a spell code, pointing it at a nearby plant. Immediately, hundreds of water droplets fly into the air, and the plant shrivels. She hits another spell code, and it reverts. The Astro Rangers applaud, and she laughs.

“Water’s sort of my thing,” she says, returning her wand to her pocket.

“So you just carry that thing around with you all the time,” Andros says, looking at the pocket she returned the wand to.

She raises her eyebrows. “Don’t use that condescending voice with me; I can see the morpher on your wrist.”

“I wasn’t being condescending!” he protests as his team laughs heartily.

“All right, Zhane, pay up,” Madison says. He grins and points at the plant she had done the spell on. It lifts in the air for a few moments then settles back down. Madison applauds for him.

She stays for nearly a month. She meets Justin, Blue Turbo, who stays with Cassie whenever he’s not busy with work. Madison’s birthday passes with no fanfare. Vida leaves a message wishing her happy birthday, but she doesn’t say anything beyond that. She wonders at that.

TJ finds her staring at her phone on the kitchen counter. “Thinking of calling home?” he asks, moving toward the fridge.

She shrugs. “More like wondering why none of them call much.”

He retrieves a container of yogurt and goes for a spoon. “What prompted that line of thought?”

She shrugs. “My sister left me a message. It was short. She didn’t ask questions.”

“And you expected her to?” he asks before taking a bite of his yogurt.

“No.”

“Then why does it bother you?”

Madison hesitates for a long time before answering. “Vida’s…not good at expressing emotion like all the rest of us humans do. I mean, if I say I’m having trouble with a guy she offers to beat him up. She shows affection through aggression and flirts through bullying and…and I’ve never doubted that she loves me more than anything in the world. But after we were rangers together…”

“It was different,” TJ guesses. “All friendships are.”

“But it’s a good different. She knows that I can take care of myself now, that I don’t need her to protect me all the time…but I think she’s overcompensating.”

“How so?” TJ asks.

“Well, I still need her for some things. Like…interviews or town hall meetings or just to back me up when I’m separating a fight. And she’s never there.” Madison’s voice gets kind of quiet at the end, and she starts idly playing with her phone for something to do.

“So you feel overwhelmed by the general public,” TJ suggests up, scraping the bottom of his yogurt container.

Madison nods slowly. “It’s just…jarring to go from being a ranger to being …”

“A celebrity?” TJ asks with a grin.

“To being someone whose opinion matters,” she says. “All I did was defeat a few monsters and now they want to know what I think about magical liquor laws. And it feels like none of my team ever weighs in. It's like, suddenly, they don't have my back anymore. And now they won’t even call and ask how I am…”

TJ’s quiet for a while, staring at his empty carton. Finally he says, “Andros and Zhane leave a lot. And Karone, but she’s got more of an excuse. Zhane’s good about telling us where he’s going and when he’ll be back. Andros…has learned to be good about it. He used to leave in the Mark II and not come back for weeks. He wouldn’t answer our calls or anything. Ashley would get so worried that eventually Carlos, Justin, and I just…put a tracker in the ship. Then we stopped calling.”

Madison raises her eyebrow. “So you’re saying they haven’t called me because they put a tracker on the bike.”

TJ laughs. “No. I’m saying that they don’t call because they’re probably not worried. We only called him because we were worried for his safety. Now that we know where he goes, we’re not worried, and we don't call. You’re not doing anything dangerous, so they’re not worried. You need space, and they’re giving it to you.”

She thinks about this for a moment. “But what if I don’t go home?”

TJ smiles at her. “You will. And they know that.”

“How do you know?”

He shrugs. “You’ll go home when you’re happy. Are you happy, Madi?”

She stares at him for a long time. “Do all the Blues have a secret email chain that I’m not a part of?”

He laughs and shakes his head in amusement. As he walks out, he stops, turns back, and says, “If you’re looking for your next place to crash, you should go check out Mariner Bay. The Lightspeed Rescue team does some charity events with us; they’re nice.”

She stares after him for a long time.

On her way out of Angel Grove, she buys a postcard with some power rangers on it and writes, “4) Don’t be distant, even if you’re distant,” on the back.

 

She visits the beach before the rangers. Or at least she tries.

She recognizes the rover sitting in the parking area and the jackets draping the inside. She parks next to it just as a man approaches, concentrating on the cell phone in his hand.

“Chad Lee?” she says automatically. He looks up from his phone, smiling reflexively like she does when someone calls her name on the street in Briarwood.

The smile becomes more genuine as he realizes who she is. “Madison Rocca! I was just emailing you to meet us here.” He reaches into the rover and pulls out a cooler. “Come on; we’re about to have lunch.”

The beach day is easy, light. There isn't a second when she feels like she's spending it with celebrities. She talks argues with Joel about the pros and cons of dragon flight versus plane flight, talks with Dana about how fast she earned her degree, with Ryan about how he found silver swimming trunks, with Captain Mitchell about how many long-lost relatives there are in the ranger community, with Kelsey about anything with wheels, with Dr. Rawlings about finishing her dissertation, with Chad about fighting and his work.

The sun starts setting before she realizes it. She ends up sitting with Carter while the rest of the team has an intense water-volleyball game. Carter sat out so she sat out in the interest of even numbered teams with the promise of playing the next game.

“Why didn't you want to play?” she asks at length.

He smiles a little. "Somebody's got to supervise," he jokes.

She stares at him for a moment. “You sound like my Green.”

“Is that a bad thing?” he asks.

“No,” she says with a shrug, looking away.

“It sounded sort of like a bad thing,” he pushes gently.

“It’s not,” she says adamantly.

He looks at her sideways before shrugging.

“It’s just...” she starts, and she sees the grin flash across his face before he hastily hides it. “He’s been acting weird lately. That’s all.” She sounds more defensive than she intends.

“Weird how?” Carter asks.

“Weird...popular? I’m not sure if that’s the right word for it, but... When he moved to Briarwood when we were seven, nobody wanted to be his friend because he was the weird new kid with the accent. But Chip and Vida, they did. And once those two have decided something there’s no stopping them. We were his only friends for years. And now he’s friends with one out of every three people in town, and he’s got this new team, and it feels like he never has time for us anymore. Like he’s just...supervising us. Not participating, not interacting, just supervising.”

“He’s a million miles away even when he’s right in front of you?” Carter says in a tone that suggests a guess. She nods. “Ryan used to be like that.” Carter looks toward his sixth. “If he wasn’t physically a million miles away, he was mentally.”

She watches Ryan score and enthusiastically high-five Kelsey. “How’d you bring him back?”

“Ice cream,” Carter says with a grin. “We bought him a lot of ice cream and forced him to talk to us.”

There's a brief silence before they both burst out laughing.

She stays for four weeks. The day she decides to leave, she drops by Chad’s job. It only takes her talking to a couple of people to find him. He’s training a dolphin in a closed show pool. She slips under the rope and watches him.

When he finally sees her, his face lights up with a grin and he waves before he turns his attention back to the training. It ends quickly after that.

He slides down into the audience section. “Hey Madison. What’s up?”

“I’m leaving,” she says. “So I thought I’d come tell you that I’m happier than when I started and ask you where I should go next.”

Chad’s smile looks a little proud of her. “Wild Force has been begging to meet the sorceress traveling around. They’re a couple of towns over.” She nods decisively.

Her postcard reads, “5) Put effort into friendships, even if that effort is just ice cream.”

 

The house is big but not as big as Cassie’s. She doesn’t even have to ring the doorbell before the door swings open. A blond woman stands inside.

“You must be the kid my team’s dying to meet,” she says, her tone suggesting that she doesn’t really care. “Come on in; make yourself comfortable.”

The woman begins walking away, leaving the door open. Madison follows more slowly, taking in her surroundings.

“Alyssa and Danny aren’t back from work yet,” the woman throws over her shoulder. “And Max and Cole are off messing around somewhere. Merrick promised he’d be home in time for dinner. So it’s just you and me for now.”

“I have no idea who any of those people are,” Madison says, following her into a kitchen area.

“Sorry,” the woman says, not sounding like it at all. She opens up a pantry and looks around for something. “I forget how out of the loop Mystic Force is. That’s why everybody’s gunning to meet you.” Madison feels vaguely like she’s been insulted but can’t pinpoint what the insult actually was. “Alyssa’s White; she’s a teacher. Danny’s Black; he does some flower shop thing. Max’s Blue, like you, and he generally does whatever he wants. Cole does some animal rescue shit; he’s Red. Merrick’s our Sixth, and he travels. And I’m Taylor, Yellow. I work for the air force.”

“And you all live here?” Madison asks, looking around the room for evidence that six people cohabitate there.

Taylor turns around and deposits a box of cereal on the counter. “Yep. Well, Merrick doesn’t really. And Danny and Max didn’t for a while because they traveled. But mostly, yeah.” She moves to open another cabinet.

“Why doesn’t Merrick really?”

Two bowls land next to the cereal, and a drawer is opened. “Because he’s always traveling. I mean, he has a room and everything, but he’s usually gone.”

Spoons come out of the drawer. Taylor starts pouring the cereal. “Then why does he still have a room?”

Taylor shrugs. “He always comes home. So we have a room for him. You want some cereal or not?”

Max enthusiastically offers to share his room with her when they all gather that night for dinner. They all ask her around a million questions about Briarwood and the Mystic Rangers and magic. She finds that she likes them.

Somewhere around two months later, she finds herself sitting by Max’s window, looking up at the stars. He sits down opposite her after a while.

“I’m thinking about leaving,” she says at length and hears the echo of her words in her memory. He nods absently. “Figured you were.”

“So is this the part where you ask me if I’m happy and tell me my next destination, or do you want to leave that for tomorrow?” she jokes.

His mouth turns up at the corners, like a half-smirk. “We can do it whenever; I’m not on a tight schedule.”

She laughs softly. They fall into comfortable silence.

“I am,” she says finally. “Happy, I mean. I’m happy.”

“Were you not before?” he asks.

She shrugs lightly, focusing on a faraway star. “Yeah, I was. A while ago. Just…never with myself. I was happy because other people made me happy, but…after being a ranger, I just got angry. I was angry at my team because I didn’t understand anything they did, but…I guess visiting all the rangers made me realize that I was really angry at myself.”

“So that’s why you left?”

“Sort of. My Red, he…he leaves a lot, and it always seems to make him feel better. It’s like he _has_ to. I guess part of wanted to…understand why he has to keep leaving. It’s not,” she says hastily, “that I mind. At all. If it makes him happy, then I'm fine with it. I just wanted to know… _why_ this makes him happy. And now I do. It’s weird, I know, but I feel closer to my team than I ever did at home. I think the distance helped me put my head on straight and see things their way. And I’m not mad anymore.”

“So why’d you steal the bike?”

She smiles reluctantly and jokes lightly, “You can’t go on a journey of self-discovery without a badass motorcycle.”

He shrugs. “Oh, I don’t know; Danny and I managed just fine.”

She rolls her eyes, and he grins at her.

She mails her final postcard the day before she leaves. It reads: “6) Go home every now and then.”

 

No, Nick never stays or leaves for long. But, now, neither does Madison.

 

_What can you do with a day?_

_What will you wake up and see?_

_The farther you get_

_The closer to me_

**Author's Note:**

> Prompt: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gs4xLRPufz8


End file.
